Impermissible and Unprecedented
by IcyKali
Summary: The Vala who would later be named Morgoth always had thoughts unlike those of the other Valar. He had great difficulty conveying one such thought to the Maia who would later be named Sauron. Angbang, though the pairing ought to be called Moron!


_Author's note: this fic was born when I realized that Sauron and Morgoth could have been the first same-gender romance in Arda. Would they have even had the vocabulary to express it? _

In the earliest days of the world, long before Melkor was rightfully named Morgoth and the First Born awakened, many key concepts were absent. However, romance was already in existence—heralded by the marriages between Valar, and continued by their Maiar servants—for the mind of Iluvatar knew certain pairs of Ainur to be couples. And though these Years of the Trees were full of unbridled light, said light also resulted in deep shadows that Melkor could seep into as a disguise, allowing him to spy on the new romantic rituals of his fellow Ainur. He watched the embraces shared by his brother Manwë and Varda, the devotion of Tilion to Arien, the rings worn by married couples, and more. When Melkor looked upon signs of love, he felt a great desire grow within him, as well as the sting of jealousy. These emotions did not stem from a lust for the light of the Ainur—he knew, for instance that his desire to possess Arien and her power had faded—these emotions were entirely new, and he understood that they concerned Mairon, the Maia who would come to be called Sauron.

Long had Melkor known Mairon to be the most accomplished of the smiths working under Aulë, but he had only taken deeper notice of Mairon when he had come bursting into Aulë's halls in a rage—a common occurrence, for his projects and Aulë's were often at odds—when Aulë was absent, off to give Yavanna a gift to soothe her offense at the loss of a tree or something of the sort. Melkor realized then that all the other Maiar fled at his fearsome appearance, but Mairon remained hard at work. Melkor had questioned him—apparently Mairon believed that if, as Iluvatar Himself had said, Melkor's actions were only the extension of His thought, Melkor must present no threat and be a crucial aspect of His plan. Melkor had seen this as naivety of the highest degree, for He had only ever hurt Melkor and subjected him to shame! However, soon he learned that Mairon had his own doubts about His plan, and viewed Melkor himself as clear proof of His indifference and inefficiency.

Eventually, Melkor and Mairon had struck a deal—Melkor would refrain from destroying the projects Aulë had made his Maiar labor over, while Mairon would report the actions of the other Ainur, for Melkor knew that Mairon had a sense of sight unparalleled, and very different from that of Arien and Manwë. And over time, Melkor and Mairon found themselves spending time with each other for other reasons. Melkor adored how Mairon was utterly sharp and cold, like ice, while Mairon grew increasingly interested in Melkor's new inventions.

Once he had discovered his feelings for Mairon, Melkor struggled to wait for him. He paced through a forest that had once been Oromë's favorite hunting spots before Melkor had struck it with blizzard after tremendous blizzard. The initial cluster of Yavanna's trees had withered away and broken, and a new variety had sprung up to replace them. These trees seemed different to Melkor, as they seemed pointed and yet brushlike at once, and they did not have flat leaves. As he passed through them, a cloud of diamond dust that clung to his head dusted them a sparkling white. He had asked Mairon to explain this new biome to him, and though he knew him well, Melkor found himself full of a fluttering, nervous energy. When he saw a blazing streak, like one of Varda's comets, touch down on a half-buried limestone boulder, he felt great relief, yet the energy increased!

Mairon's black skin and glowing eyes stood out from the plain of white. He nodded to Melkor before turning his attention to the way the ice and snow instantly sublimated under his touch, which burned like fire.

Melkor felt suddenly self-conscious and noticed that a crust of ice crystals had formed over his face—he had been unintentionally sweating. He sent some heat to his face and melted the crust away, before shapeshifting so that his form did not tower over Mairon's. He then approached him and decided to give voice to his feelings without further preamble. "Mairon, I love you!" Melkor's booming voice shook the forest. Ice sheets shattered and snow fell from the trees, which swayed at the sound.

"Thank you, Lord Melkor." Mairon did not look away from his investigation and moved to examine the treebark.

Melkor suspected Mairon did not fully grasp the depth of his feelings. "Ah, Mairon, I mean that I_ love _you. Is my meaning clear to you?"

"Yes. We've spent quite a lot of time together recently and find a sort of confidant in each other… that means it would be accurate to label our relationship as a friendship, and that is considered a form of love. I deduce that it's friendship you're referring to based on your effusiveness, not your love of my skill." Mairon tested the strength of the branches, observing how they perked up when he melted the snow pulling them down, and then tore a few branches off to discover how they smelled when they were set aflame.

"Nay, Mairon, I am referring to a feeling greater than friendship."

"You mean to say I'm your best friend?" asked Mairon, disinterestedly. "Considering we have no other friends, that distinction is rather meaningless."

At such bold words, Melkor felt the urge to pull Mairon close and run his hands through his kinky hair. Remembering the gifts that Ainur in courtship would share, Melkor drove his hand through the the snow he had bade fall and reached for a mineral deposit. He pulled out raw material and pressed it in his hands, adding heat and sparks which danced through the forest and lit up the snow. When he was finished, he had produced a dark brown agate with a pattern within shaped like scales, each with a single ember held inside it. He presented it to Mairon. "Have this gem I created, Mairon," he said, trying and failing to imitate the soft tone of voice those in love always seemed to speak in.

Mairon gingerly took it and examined it. "This is of excellent quality. I'm impressed by your ingenuity, Lord Melkor," he said. "Now, what it is you'd like me to make for you from this?"

Melkor grinned, the eerie violet glow of his dark eyes brightening with joy. "You wish to give me a gift in return? My feelings are returned!"

"What do you mean? Didn't you hand me this because you want me to provide my service?"

"Nay…" Melkor struggled to find the words to explain his intentions. "I did not give you a gift because I required anything. I simply thought that participating in the tradition of courtship gifts would cause you to understand my love for you!"

Mairon's eyes widened and he turned fully toward Melkor, giving him his full attention for the first time that night. "This is a gift of courtship?" His grip on the agate tightened. "Are you saying you want me to be your spouse?!"

"Yes," answered Melkor, somewhat tentatively. It bothered him that Mairon appeared concerned and not elated.

"You wish for us to be as Manwë and Varda?" asked Mairon, incredulously.

"What?! Never would I desire such a thing!"

Mairon's third eye flared to life. He took a stance, as if ready to strike Melkor. "Then you wish for us to be as Aulë and Yavanna? You want us to be bound together in misery and for us to argue constantly and undercut each other's plans? I refuse to let you interfere in my ambitions!" he snapped.

The icy crust returned to Melkor's face, but he willed it away. "No one will dare keep us bound, Mairon. We shall be united in causing others pain, not causing ourselves pain! I simply meant I want us to share the devotion of a spousal relationship."

Mairon glared at him, but relaxed. "Then have you just been restating that we will be Master and Lieutenant?" he asked, for Melkor had promised that one day, Mairon would be able to serve him openly in that fashion.

Melkor mumbled something inaudible, embers flying from his mouth. Mairon sighed and turned away again, back to his experimentation. This was far more difficult than Melkor had expected.

* * *

"...you see, in this environment you have created, far less water infiltrates into the earth. Thus, the trees have adapted by forming small, needle-shaped leaves instead. With leaves far less broad, less is exposed to dehydration, and…"

Melkor felt a unique joy when sitting beside Mairon. He loved how Mairon explained phenomena to him—he was the most intelligent, insightful of the Ainur, in Melkor's mind. A new realization fell upon him, as the light of the Silver Tree brushed over the landscape on this kind of night. "Mairon, I understand now!"

"Well, that is fortunate. To be perfectly honest, I wasn't certain that you would—I do not know how much you understand of plants," said Mairon.

Melkor put his hands on Mairon's shoulders. "I do not merely wish for us to be Master and Lieutenant, because despite the devotion inherent in that relationship, there would still be a divide. Nay, I long for something greater—closer to your being a Master as well."

"This subject again?" asked Mairon. However, that final sentence piqued his interest. "I'd be a Master, you say?" He smirked, a rare display of happiness. "In that case, yes, I certainly return all of your feelings, Lord Melkor!"

Melkor smiled at this, but resisted the urge to allow himself to be beguiled. "You misunderstand once more, Mairon. In a formal capacity, I will still be the Master, and you the Lieutenant."

Mairon huffed and pushed Melkor's hands off him.

"Yet as spouses, we will both show each other the respect we deserve, together!"

"Very well." Mairon paused. "And which one of us is the wife?"

Morgoth gazed into the shining white field. In many places it was disrupted by the trails of flame he and Mairon had left as they had walked, revealing the dull grey stone and black substrate beneath. He mulled over Mairon's question, picturing the Valarin couples. Varda was far more powerful than Manwë, yet Vána was far weaker than Oromë. Others seemed equal in strength. Melkor's leaner body type more closely resembled those of the female Vala than Mairon, who was more muscular, but other Ainur's shapes did not follow such principles. Nothing appeared consistent, aside from one being female and the other male, and he and Mairon did not fit that standard. "...We do not need a wife," he decided.

"But if it lacks a wife, how will it stand as a marriage?"

"Ah, our union will be an _improved _marriage, far greater than those currently in existence!" Melkor rose, and unintentionally grew in stature before correcting it again.

Mairon smirked again and his slitted pupils widened in excitement. He gripped Melkor's robe. "Lord Melkor, if you wanted me to improve upon an institution and increase its efficiency, you ought to have told me!"

* * *

"...and there will no need for a ceremony, for that would be wasted time for industrious Ainur!" Mairon concluded his rant. By now, the silver light of evening was beginning to dim, and the golden light of morning was tingeing the distant horizon a light peach. Finally, Mairon's Great Eye flashed in Melkor's vision—a sign that he was focused on him! Melkor's heart swelled with affection at the roaring, twisted flames.

"Excellent work!" Melkor applauded, causing sharp stalagmites of ice to break through the surface of the snow and for more diamond dust to swirl around him and Mairon.

Mairon stroked his chin and looked askance. "Although, without the ceremony, wife, gifts, audience, usual setting, or witnesses, what is it that even defines it as a coupling? A devotion and shared strength defines many different bonds, as we've established… tell me, Lord Melkor, why is it that you wanted to improve upon a marriage specifically?"

Melkor felt one of his cheeks growing hot, while the other turned frigid. He cleared his throat. "Well, for instance, I do very much like to wreak havoc on the other institutions of the Ainur together, only for us to then lie down side-by-side—"

"Like brothers?"

Melkor cut himself off with another scream. The ice shattered and the trees creaked from the shockwave. "Never as brothers!"

Mairon did not even flinch, though he appeared mildly aggravated due to the volume of Melkor's cry. "My apologies, Lord Melkor, that was tactless of me. What is it you intended to express?"

Melkor took several deep breaths of the diamond dust to cool his temper before he continued. "I wish to kiss and hold you as well."

"And how would this differ from close friendship?"

Melkor came close to him. "I can kiss you and demonstrate it!"

"Go on."

Melkor leaned down and closed the distance between them. He reveled in the way Mairon's hot cheek pushed against his hooked nose, and in the overall hard feel of Mairon's form. However, Mairon was still as a stone and seemed to not react to the kiss itself—instead, he kept all of his eyes open and fixed on the steam that emanated from their kiss and curled up into the trees. Only when Melkor pulled away did Mairon blink. "That is a fascinating instance of sublimation," he said.

Melkor smiled. "Now, do you understand the feeling that separates this from friendship?"

"The feeling of the steam running between us?"

"Nay, the warm, tight, fluttering feeling!"

Mairon's eyes narrowed. "Are you referring to the feel of my skin? The feel of your own extreme heat?"

"Nay, the feeling in our hearts!"

"...Do you require a healer." He did not phrase it as a question.

Melkor released him and took a step back. "You mean to tell me you felt nothing of the sort?"

"You're correct. I did not feel anything like that," said Mairon. "Nothing in my heart, like you're describing."

Melkor resisted the urge to collapse into the snow and went up to the largest of the trees in the forest and leaned his head against it. His hair flared out around him as billowing smoke, keeping the daylight out of his face. He wondered how it could be so difficult to convey his feelings for Mairon when it came as easily as song to the other Ainur—or perhaps, he considered, that was why. Their version of what he felt must have been one of Iluvatar's preferred themes in the Music, whereas what he felt must be his own creation. If this be true, he thought, that is all the more reason to labor long hours to express it to Mairon!

He must have stood with his head against the bark for some time, for the Great Eye flashed in his peripheral vision. Melkor looked back to Mairon, who was impatiently turning the agate over in his hands. Melkor was surprised he was still holding it. "Lord Melkor, there is no need to be sullen," said Mairon. "I still appreciate your creativity and adore the power you provide me. Even if I don't return whatever it is you're feeling, it's not as if I don't enjoy your company."

Melkor grimaced. "I hate it when you pity me."

"And I hate it when you are pitiable," said Mairon. "Now, I must ask for your permission to leave—there is only so long I can be absent from the forge before someone will ask after me. You know that my skill is indispensable…"

However, all Melkor could focus on was the way Mairon carefully held the agate, as if it were made of glass, not stone. The fiery shapes within the gem glinted in the golden light spilling over everything, mirroring Melkor's thought as it came alive. "Wait, Mairon, before you leave, I bid you tell me—do _you _ever wish to hold or kiss me, and long to wreak havoc and then come to rest and gloat by my side?"

Mairon went silent and still. Melkor felt a ripple of heat emanate from him before Mairon suddenly stopped it. Melkor looked on him in confusion before he realized—Mairon's skin was black and hid the color of his blushing, but the heat it produced could be felt. Melkor felt his own cheeks grow hot and cold in answer. "You do wish it!" Melkor joyously exclaimed. "You must have lied when you said you felt nothing at our kiss!"

Mairon glared up at him. "...I never claimed to have felt nothing. I said I didn't feel whatever you meant by a warm, fluttering tightness in our hearts."

Melkor held out his arms, beckoning Mairon to embrace him. When Mairon surprised him by making no attempt to decline or resist, Melkor felt the fluttering feeling return full-force! He pulled Mairon close. "I ought to have simply asked you to put your feelings into words! After all, your explanations are always impeccable. Tell me, what brings you pleasure from such displays affection?"

"...It provides me with useful vantage points from which to observe the interesting way that half of your face turns icy blue and the other half turns a hot orange whenever you blush, for one thing…" Mairon muttered. Melkor did not fail to take note of how Mairon ran his hands through Melkor's hair as they held each other.

"Do you see? We are greater together!"

"...In any case, I've been absent too long. It's not the time for this," said Mairon. "Do you want to defeat the purpose of having a spy among the other Ainur?"

Melkor nuzzled against him once more before releasing him. He watched with rapt attention as Mairon transformed into an orb of fire and made his escape, racing to the horizon and melting a dark line through the snow as he weaved between the trees. And when in later times honored historians would write that all love had fled from the heart of Morgoth and that Sauron only invoked his name to induce fear and worship, perhaps these words unknowingly concealed an impermissible, unprecedented love.


End file.
